{"ID":3006182,"CreatedAt":"2026-06-03T03:09:48.883664427Z","UpdatedAt":"2026-06-04T19:14:31.964469513Z","DeletedAt":null,"paper_url":"https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.03038","arxiv_id":"2606.03038","title":"Will Accurate Fields Mislead Photonic Design? FromGlobal Accuracy to Port Readout","abstract":"Neural field surrogates can accelerate photonic design loops, but a surrogate that looks accurate in global field error can still mis-rank candidate devices when the final decision depends on localized output-port readouts. This risk is acute in propagation-dominated MMI splitters and couplers, where port power, splitting, phase, and coupling are determined by accumulated modal interference and output-window aggregation rather than by average field similarity alone. We study this field-to-design mismatch through a Field/Mediator/Readout view that separates dense complex-field error from propagation-profile and output-window errors before port aggregation. To align the surrogate with this chain, we propose PaNO, a propagation-aligned neural operator that keeps the full-field prediction interface while organizing latent states around local boundary structure, transverse modal content, axial propagation, and cross-mode interaction. We also evaluate PaNO-R2, an output-aware feedback variant for residual field components near the port region. On a 15-wavelength tunable $3{\\times}3$ MMI benchmark with 4608 held-out fields, PaNO lowers NeurOLight's port-power error from 0.2018 to 0.0739 despite slightly higher cMAE, showing that global field accuracy alone is not sufficient for design-relevant readout fidelity. PaNO-R2 attains the best cMAE, propagation-profile error, output-profile error, and port-power error, reducing NeurOLight's port-power and output-profile errors by 72.7\\% and 72.5\\%.","short_abstract":"Neural field surrogates can accelerate photonic design loops, but a surrogate that looks accurate in global field error can still mis-rank candidate devices when the final decision depends on localized output-port readouts. This risk is acute in propagation-dominated MMI splitters and couplers, where port power, splitt...","url_abs":"https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.03038","url_pdf":"https://arxiv.org/pdf/2606.03038v1","authors":"[\"Yitian Zhang\",\"Yonghong chen\",\"Youming Chen\",\"Yiyang Li\",\"Xing Zhe\",\"Renhe Lu\",\"Shaolin Liao\",\"Yuzhe Ma\",\"Zhong Guan\"]","published":"2026-06-02T02:23:20Z","proceeding":"cs.LG","tasks":"[\"cs.LG\",\"physics.comp-ph\",\"physics.optics\"]","methods":"[\"Generative Adversarial Network\"]","has_code":false}